Galway Chess Congress 2017: March 10 - 12

Ficheall

It is a bit of a balancing act, agreed, and difficult to please all of the people all of the time - or, indeed, some of the people any of the time.

Still - at least you'll have been happy that your wishes were complied with this year and none of those pesky sub-1750 players were permitted in the Masters section. Further such helpful suggestions for improvements to the tournament are always welcome.

sodacat11

Ficheall wrote: »

It is a bit of a balancing act, agreed, and difficult to please all of the people all of the time - or, indeed, some of the people any of the time.

Still - at least you'll have been happy that your wishes were complied with this year and none of those pesky sub-1750 players were permitted in the Masters section. Further such helpful suggestions for improvements to the tournament are always welcome.

I was very happy with the Galway tournament on all counts apart from the one we've been discussing. I think that Galway and Cork would get more entries if they weren't held so close to each other and to so many other chess events.There are months like August and October where there is very little (if anything) chesswise that maybe some tournament or the NCC could move to.

cdeb

The NCC presumably needs to be a good bit in advance of the Europeans (Oct this year)

Sunny evenings don't lend themselves to chess. I can see why most tournaments are in Oct-Mar.

Pete Morriss

sodacat11 wrote: »

Generous prizes attract entrants but obviously these aren't feasible without the requisite numbers.

That is true (indeed, tautologous). But the prizes on offer in the Galway Masters were relatively generous and did not attract the hoped-for number of entrants. Conversely, the prizes in the Majors and Minors sections were considerably less generous, but entries were fairly reasonable.

There seems to be a secular trend of declining numbers in the top sections of tournaments in Ireland (except perhaps Bunratty), which has been discussed previously on this forum. In Galway, for instance, there were 44 in the top section in both 2010 and 2011, which has declined consistently year-on-year to the 16 of this year. The presence of titled players seems to make no difference to the number of entries: in both 2010 and 2011 there were two GMs playing, and either one or no IMs, yet entries were much higher than this year with two GMs and three IMs.

Every year we discuss what we can do to attract more players to the tournament, and we are always glad of all suggestions from outside the club (preferably with some supporting evidence). It would, for instance be a big gamble for anybody to put on a tournament in Ireland in August - it might work, or it might not, and if it didn't it would lose a lot of money. It would be impossible in Galway, as hotels are far more expensive then.

It's flattering for us to be compared with Gibraltar, but unfortunately all we have in common as chess tournaments is that both locations start with the letter G.

Tim Harding

The June bank holiday is an obvious slot that is not being used for a congress. (Perhaps because it is just before the national school exams which would rule out a lot of juniors and their families?) Those who like to sunbathe in the Irish summer rain (frequent at that time of year) are not compelled to enter.

I also wish that the LCU would go back to having round 6 of the Armstrong in early December, so that only five rounds are required to be scheduled in the busy congress season between Christmas and Easter.

Pete Morriss

Ficheall wrote: »

Still - at least you'll have been happy that none of those pesky sub-1750 players were permitted in the Masters section. Further such helpful suggestions for improvements to the tournament are always welcome.

Yes, and as a result we seem to have lost all last year's entrants in the 1700-1749 range (none of whom played in the Majors this year) and not gained anybody for the Masters: not the best decision we have ever made!

Pete Morriss

sodacat11 wrote: »

We will just have to agree to disagree, if your way of estimating the entry is to go back three years . The entry in 2014 was 105 in total,as far as I can see that was only about 15 more than this year so I still don't get how you could have reasonably expected to pay out a 250 euro grading prize or why that was reduced by as much as 80%. What was the grading prize paid out in 2014?

Sorry, I meant 2013 (the 2013-14 season), when we had over 150. That was also the average in the early years of this decade; there may be other reasons for the decline in Galway since then which I won't go into here, but we hope that we will be able to get back to our 2010 to 2013 level, with the support of people like sodacat11.

Pete Morriss

Tim Harding wrote: »

The June bank holiday is an obvious slot that is not being used for a congress.

The Drogheda Congress has been on the June bank holiday for several years. It is not on the Calendar for 2017, so perhaps they are not holding it? It would be good to know.

For what it is worth, quite a few people have told us that they didn't play in our Rapidplays in June because they didn't want to risk missing the Irish summer; whether they are to be believed is, of course, another matter.

2bts

The Galway congress used to be in mid-October (2011, 12, 13, 14).
How do the numbers for March/April compare to October (2016, 17)?

October seemed the better fit, IMHO.

sodacat11

There is very little on in October and unless one lives in Dublin not much in September. I know in my own case that I don't have much interest in chess during the summer months but once September arrives I begin to get the bug again.
The Enniscorthy tournament last year was very enjoyable,I hope that it will be on again this year.

Danville

I think THE major problem for Galway is that it has not settled on a year-on-year weekend. Indeed trying to shoehorn itself into the busiest period in the weekender events calendar is not going to work. Galways best chance IMHO is to settle on a weekend in October. Someone already mentioned six weekenders in an eight week period. Remember we are depending on a relatively small pool of tournament players to support all events. I have only played Galway once, in October, planned to go again the following October but it was not held. I/we all know more or less when all the main weekenders are on,( and plan accordingly), except Galway as it flits about and so cannot expect players to give it their number one preference. I would like to support it, and expect I will support it regularly when and if it finally settles down in OCTOBER.

brilliantboy

Danville wrote: »

I think THE major problem for Galway is that it has not settled on a year-on-year weekend. Indeed trying to shoehorn itself into the busiest period in the weekender events calendar is not going to work. Galways best chance IMHO is to settle on a weekend in October. Someone already mentioned six weekenders in an eight week period. Remember we are depending on a relatively small pool of tournament players to support all events. I have only played Galway once, in October, planned to go again the following October but it was not held. I/we all know more or less when all the main weekenders are on,( and plan accordingly), except Galway as it flits about and so cannot expect players to give it their number one preference. I would like to support it, and expect I will support it regularly when and if it finally settles down in OCTOBER.

According to the ICU ratings website numbers are down overall from 155 in 2011 to 98 this year. However this year's numbers weren't wildly different from 2014, the last time the tournament was held in October.

The decline is most apparent in the Masters section, down from 44 in 2011 to 16 this year. Free/reduced entry this year wasn't incentive enough it seems. Maybe they want to be paid to attend? :rolleyes:

Pete Morriss

Here is a brief report on the Galway Congress, with prize-winners. A fuller report is available here.

Just under a hundred players took part in the 2017 Galway Congress. The numbers were reduced a little as inexplicably the Leinster Schools Chess Association chose to schedule its finals on a date that clashed, thus depriving many of the most active juniors in Leinster of the opportunity of playing in one of Ireland’s leading tournaments. There was also a comparatively small field in the Masters section, despite it being very strong at the top with two GMs and three IMs. Nevertheless, the hundred who did play seemed to enjoy themselves, and the building work in the hotel was scarcely noticeable: if we had known that the resulting disruption would be so insignificant, we wouldn’t have compensated by reducing the entry fees!

The prize winners were
Masters: First: GM Oleg Korneev (Spain); Second: IM Alex Lopez (Ireland); Third equal: GM Alex Baburin (Ireland) and IM Craig Pritchett (Scotland); Grading: Peter Cafolla; Connaught Champion: FM Philip Short
Major: First: Christopher Young; Second equal: Anastasia Mohylna, James Danaher, Robert Murtagh, Jason Rawlinson, James Naughton; Grading Prize 1: Adam Murphy (also second equal); Grading Prize 2: Eoin Hunter
Minors: First: Hugh O’Connor; Second equal: Aidan O’Sullivan, K S Gopal, Dylan Murphy; Grading Prize 1: Andrejs Kozlovs (also second equal); Grading Prize 2: Jack McIntyre.

Endgame

Pete Morriss wrote: »

The Drogheda Congress has been on the June bank holiday for several years. It is not on the Calendar for 2017, so perhaps they are not holding it? It would be good to know.

For what it is worth, quite a few people have told us that they didn't play in our Rapidplays in June because they didn't want to risk missing the Irish summer; whether they are to be believed is, of course, another matter.

Gentlemen, the Drogheda congress will be taking place this Bank Holiday w/e continuing 30+ years of the event. There is a placeholder on the ICU website, only was submitted last week though. The usual venue, the Boyne Valley hotel is unavailable due to extensive renovations/remodelling hence the lack of official announcement as early as would normally have been done. Venue still TBD.

2bts

see http://www.icu.ie/events/901